A fine medieval, moated great house (with additions – mainly Victorian – and renovation), now a National Trust property. The date 1482, the foundation date, is inscribed on stone set into the mellow brick wall. It is notable for the style of the individual numbers, not uncommon for the period but difficult to read today.

TIME AND TALENTS SETTLEMENT, BERMONDSEY, LONDON (1907)

Built as a hostel for the Time and Talents Association, as announced in the Arts and Crafts lettering in carved stone frieze that reads ‘TIME AND TALENTS SETTLEMENT’. The building is of purple brick with red brick and stone dressings. The ground floor is recessed and roughcast, articulated by banded piers of dark brick and Portland stone with stylised Ionic capitals. The upper floors are framed by red brick quoin and central pilasters, with gauged, red brick flat arches and red brick dressings to the horned 12-pane sashes.

The right side has steeply pitched crow-stepped gable hiding attic windows. The interior apparently retains a grand chimney piece on the first floor. The Time and Talents Association was an Anglican quasi-missionary organisation set up in 1895 by West End women to help young working girls and women, and was a prominent part of the1880-1914 settlement movement. Young women came in to Bermondsey from more prosperous areas and the building hosted clubs, district visiting and campaigning around issues of girls’ safety at work.

This building is listed (Grade II) for its imaginative yet contextual Arts and Crafts design by an eminent architect to house a historically significant settlement for working girls and young women. ENGLISH HERITAGE

The date 1771 has been roughly scratched with something like a large nail into a ham stone cornerstone. At one time it must have formed part of our house, or an outbuilding. We found it half-buried by the house and for many years it has been set into one end of a stone-walled flowerbed. Now we have found a better use for it, blocking a large hole in a wall of the house